Guest Post + Giveaway: The Midnight Spell by Rhiannon Frater + Kody Boye

Please welcome today's paranormal guest authors Rhiannon Frater and Kody Boye!  Rhiannon and Kody are coauthors of THE MIDNIGHT SPELL.  We have a special giveaway for you, but first, check out this fab guest post...

Magical Love Spells in Fiction

by Rhiannon Frater and Kody Boye

Rhiannon’s Perspective

When Kody Boye and I decided to write The Midnight Spell, we immediately tossed back a few ideas about how the magic in the book would work. One of the things we decided was to take a few things from traditional lore (broomsticks, cat familiars, cauldrons), but also infuse the witches of our story with their own brand of magic. We were also in agreement that we would not use any real spells in the book or reference the Wiccan religion. Our witches are purely fictional, purely magical, and not tethered to any religion or belief system.

Of course, the fact that we decided to create our own magic was challenging and fun. We tossed back all sorts of ideas for spells, discussed what the magic would look like, and how we wanted it to contrast with the real world that Adam and Christy live in. No one knows Christy and her family are magical beings. Even Adam is skeptical when Christy comes out of the broom closet when he reveals his own sexuality. Christy and her family are not even from our world, but one that used to exist in its shadow. They’re evacuees from a magical world that no longer exists, so there is a lot about Christy’s mother and father that is swathed in mystery.

Though we did pull on legend and myth for various other parts of the book, especially our big bad monster, we had a lot of fun creating our own magical world.

Kody’s Perspective

A lot of the initial world building within The Midnight Spell was in regards to the magical system and how it interacted with the ‘real world.’ It seems commonplace to insert the Salem Trials (or even aspects of Wicca) whenever witches are present. While it is a helpful foundation to build upon in some cases, it becomes repetitive and, dare I say, boring. (At this point, I’d rather read about the actual happenings of the Salem Witch Trials rather than see them with magic.)

For that reason, we completely disregarded any traditional lore. We threw out anything that might connect it to any religion (pentagrams being the prime example) and completely created our own mythos. Christy was, and is, a completely magical being, completely unrelated to the modern world we are used to. For The Midnight Spell, we wanted to turn the tables on the traditional aspects of fantastic monsters, which is why we chose to only use inspiration from the legend (rather than the legends themselves) to create the flesh and blood (or not) creatures.

The Midnight Spell by Rhiannon Frater and Kody Boye.

Adam and Christy have been best friends since kindergarten. Always the perpetual outsiders in their small town in Texas, they’ve always had to deal with nasty comments from their classmates. Adam is called “gay” while Christy is called “witch.”

On both counts the bullies are right.

Their junior year in high school seems destined to be the same old same old until Christy decides to cast a love spell for Adam at the midnight hour. The next day an alluring and mysterious new boy enrolls at school and sets hearts a flutter, including Adam’s. Meanwhile, Christy’s mad crush on the handsome Ian seems to be going nowhere fast. Struggling to capture the heart of Ian while trying to come into her full witch powers is tough enough, but when a great evil arrives in town that threatens everything they hold dear, she realizes that finding a boyfriend is the least of her and Adam’s worries.

Soon Adam, Christy, their potential love interests, and their good friends Drifter and Olivia, will have to battle a force of darkness that has killed in their town before, and will again.

Release Date: February 28, 2013

Genre: Paranormal, Young Adult

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Thank you Rhiannon and Kody for joining us here today at From the Shadows!

To learn more about Kody Boye and his books, please visit his website.  To learn more about Rhiannon Frater and her books, please visit her website and don't miss our 2010 interview with Rhiannon here at From the Shadows.

Dying to read The Midnight Spell?  We've got you covered.

***The Midnight Spell Giveaway***

We are giving away an ebook copy of THE MIDNIGHT SPELL to one lucky winner!

To enter, please leave a comment on this post and include your email address so that we may contact you if you win.  This giveaway is INTERNATIONAL.  Giveaway ends May 17, 2014 midnight EST.

Good luck!